“What a coincidence,” Emeline said.
Tobias regarded her with dry disbelief. “I hope you are not going to say that you are also inclined in that direction, Miss Emeline.”
“I have no interest in becoming a gamester, of course.” Emeline cast a quick look at Lavinia and delicately cleared her throat. “But I was just explaining to Aunt Lavinia that I have decided to embark upon a career myself. I would like to begin training for my new profession immediately.”
“And I was just telling Emeline that she need not even consider such a course of action.” Lavinia refolded her newspaper. “Her social calendar is quite full these days. She has no time to study a profession.”
“That is not true,” Emeline said. “I intend to follow in your footsteps, Lavinia.”
There was a short, extremely heavy silence.
Lavinia finally realized that her mouth had fallen open in a most unattractive fashion. She managed to get it closed.
“Ridiculous,” she said.
“I want to become your assistant, just as Anthony is doing with Mr. March.”
Lavinia stared at her, frozen in her chair by the sheer horror of it all.
“Ridiculous,” she said again. “Your parents would be shocked at the very notion of their dear daughter going into trade.”
“My parents are dead, Aunt Lavinia. Their feelings need not be considered in this matter.”
“But you know perfectly well how they would feel about it. When you came into my care I assumed a certain responsibility to establish you in the world as they would have wished. A lady does not go into this sort of business.”
Emeline smiled. “You are in the business and I consider you a lady.” She looked at Tobias. “Don’t you consider Aunt Lavinia a lady, sir?”
“Absolutely,” Tobias said easily. “I will call out any man who says otherwise.”
Lavinia rounded on him. “This is your doing, sir. You have put this crazed notion into Emeline’s head as well as Anthony’s.”
“I fear you cannot blame Mr. March,” Emeline said.
Tobias swallowed some of the biscuit and held up both hands, palms out. “I assure you, I gave neither of them any encouragement.”
Emeline smiled across the rim of her coffee cup. “If you must blame someone, blame yourself, Aunt Lavinia. You have been my greatest inspiration since the day I came to live with you.”
“Me?” Lavinia was stunned into momentary speechlessness a second time. She wondered if she was on the verge of swooning. She had never actually experienced a fainting spell, but surely this sensation of breathless dread was a prelude to such an event.
“Indeed,” Emeline continued firmly. “You have impressed me greatly with your astonishing ability to come about after the most devastating reversals of fortune. Reversals that would have crushed most people, male or female. I do so admire your extraordinary resilience and cleverness.”
Tobias’s mouth twitched. “Not to mention your ingenious ability to garner invitations to some of the most important and exclusive social affairs of the Season, Lavinia. No one else of my acquaintance could have managed to combine an investigation into murder with the successful launch of a young lady into Society as you did a few weeks ago, madam. It was a truly astonishing feat.”
Lavinia propped her elbows on the table and dropped her face into her hands. “This is a disaster.”
“Emeline is quite right to hold you up as a paragon and model of female behavior.” Tobias picked up his coffee cup. “Indeed, I do not see how she could do better than to look to you for inspiration.”
Lavinia raised her head and glared at him. “Kindly cease your teasing, sir. I am not in the mood for it.”
Before Tobias could respond, Mrs. Chilton walked into the breakfast room bearing a heavily laden dish. “Here ye are, sir. Eggs and potatoes.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Chilton. Your talents in the kitchen are really quite remarkable. If you ever take a notion to leave your present employer, I hope you will apply for a position in my household.”
Mrs. Chilton chuckled. “Doubt that’ll happen, sir. But I thank you for the offer. Will there be anything else?”
Tobias tilted the small jam pot to examine the interior. “I believe that we are out of your excellent currant jam, Mrs. Chilton. I vow, it is far and away the best I have ever tasted.”
“I’ll fetch some more.”
Mrs. Chilton vanished back through the door that led to the kitchen.
Lavinia gave Tobias a repressive look. He gave no indication that he noticed. He was too busy with his eggs and potatoes.
“I’ll thank you not to try to steal my staff, sir,” she said.
Emeline uttered a tiny, dramatic little exclamation and made a show of glancing at the watch pinned to her bodice. “Oh, dear, you will have to excuse me.” She folded her napkin and rose lightly to her feet. “I must go and dress. Priscilla and her mama will be here shortly. I promised that I would accompany them on a shopping expedition this morning.”
“Emeline, wait,” Lavinia said quickly. “About this notion of a career-”
“I will discuss it with you later.” Emeline gave her a jaunty wave from the doorway. “I must hurry. Wouldn’t want to keep Lady Wortham waiting.”
She disappeared down the hall before Lavinia could argue the matter.
Silence descended on the breakfast room.
Left with no other target, Lavinia turned back to Tobias. She pushed aside her plate and folded her arms on the table.
“This business of Anthony wanting to follow in your footsteps has obviously put some extremely misguided notions into Emeline’s head.”
Tobias set down his knife and fork and looked at her. The amusement was gone from his eyes, she noticed. It had been replaced by a far more serious expression, one that was not devoid of sympathy and understanding.
“Believe it or not, Lavinia, I comprehend your concerns more deeply than you can imagine. I am no more eager for Anthony to pursue a career as an investigator than you are for Emeline to do so.”
“What are we to do to change their minds?”
“I haven’t the foggiest notion.” Tobias swallowed some coffee. “And I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that the matter is out of our hands, in any event. We can guide but we cannot control them.”
“This is dreadful. Just dreadful. She will ruin herself if she is not careful.”
“Come now, Lavinia. You overstate the case. This situation may not be to your liking, but there is no need to resort to theatrics. It is hardly a tragedy.”
“Perhaps not in your opinion, but it certainly is in mine. I had so hoped to see Emeline safely established in a home of her own with a husband who cared for her, one who could support her in a suitable fashion. No gentleman of the ton will even consider marrying a lady who works at this investigation business.”
Tobias watched her with enigmatic eyes. “Do you dream of such a fine marriage for yourself also, madam?”
She was utterly floored by that wholly unexpected question. For a second or two, she could not think of what to say.
“Of course not,” she finally got out quite brusquely. “I have no interest whatsoever in marrying again.”
“Is it because you loved your first husband so deeply that you cannot bring yourself to even consider a second marriage?”
An odd panic assailed her. This was a truly dangerous topic of discussion. She did not want to even start down this road, she thought, because it would inevitably lead to painful speculation on the depth of Tobias’s love for the wife he had lost in childbirth. She doubted very much that she would ever be able to compete with Ann’s beautiful, gentle ghost. Anthony had described his sister as an angel.
Whatever else I am, Lavinia thought, including a so-called paragon of the sort of female who can live by her wits, I am no angel.
“Really, sir,” she said briskly, “it is not my opinions of marriage that we are discussing. This is about Emeline’s future.”